Feedbacks of Alpine Wetlands on the Tibetan Plateau to the Atmosphere
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WETLANDS AND CLIMATE CHANGE
Feedbacks of Alpine Wetlands on the Tibetan Plateau to the Atmosphere Da Wei 1 & Hui Zhao 1 & Lin Huang 2 & Yahui Qi 1,3 & Xiaodan Wang 1 Received: 31 July 2019 / Accepted: 6 September 2019 # Society of Wetland Scientists 2019
Abstract The alpine wetlands of the Tibetan Plateau (TP) contribute 30%–40% of China’s natural wetlands, and they are experiencing changes in climate, i.e. warming of 0.26 °C 10 yr−1 (since the 1950s), as well as considerable human impacts. Consequently, alpine wetland extent show strong response to these impacts in most part, a reduction since the 1970s, followed by a recovery since the 2000s. In the eastern TP, they suffered stronger human regulations in Zoige mires, i.e. decades’ drainage and recent restoration. These alpine wetlands have long been considered as a vital CH4 source, while inventories and model simulations estimated these wetlands emit roughly 1 Tg CH4C yr−1 and predicted an increase due to increased temperature and recovery of wetland extent. The alpine wetlands are generally a CO2 sink of roughly 15.8 Tg CO2 yr−1, mitigating half of their emitted CH4, and satellite-based observations of vegetation greening have observed that their plants took more CO2 from the atmosphere. Furthermore, the alpine wetlands provide a biophysical cooling effect, due to higher evaporative energy loss during early growing seasons. Variations in both climate changes and human influences have been well documented and indicate that these alpine wetlands provide vital feedbacks to the climate. Keywords Climate changes . Human impacts . Alpine wetlands . Feedback . Tibetan plateau
Introduction Averaging over 4000 m in altitude (Fig. 1a), the Tibetan Plateau (TP) is home to world’s largest alpine biome (Miehe et al. 2019), including alpine shrub, meadow, steppe and
desert from the southeast to the northwest (Tibetan Plateau Scientific Expedition 1988; Editorial Board of Vegetation Map of China 2001). By contrast, the alpine wetlands are scattered across the whole TP because of the undulating terrain and permafrost (or seasonal frozen) in this region (Tibetan
Da Wei and Hui Zhao equally contributed to this work Key Points ?(1) The alpine wetlands experienced Bshrink-then-recovery^ since the 1970s. (2) The alpine wetlands emit roughly 1 Tg CH4-C yr−1 but warming strengthened the emission. (3) Alpine wetlands are a net CO2 sink, mitigating half of the CH4 in global warming potential. (4) Alpine wetlands also provide biophysical cooling effect, both at local and regional scale. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s13157-019-01220-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Xiaodan Wang [email protected] 1
Key Laboratory of Mountain Surface Processes and Ecological Regulation, Institute of Mountain Hazards and Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No.9, Section 4, Renminnanlu Road, Chengdu, Sichuan 610041, People’s Republic of China
2
Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural
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